The Stochastic Man

“—as the digit shifts, let us wipe clean the slate—”

“—we have been through the ordeal by fire—”

“—the time has come to build the ultimate society—”

The Ultimate Society.I heard the click and the whirr, and the sound was not so much the shifting of the digit as the extrusion of a new political slogan, and I didn’t need great stochastic gifts to guess that we would all hear much, much more about the Ultimate Society before Paul Qui

Damn, but he was compelling! I was eager to be off and into the night’s exploits, and still I sat motionless, rapt, and so did this whole audience of boozy pols and stoned celebrities, and even the waiters halted their eternal clashing of trays as Qui

He finished with a flourish and we were up and screaming, no need of Mardikian’s choreography now, and the media folk were ru

It was an hour more before Sundara and Friedman and Catalina and I got out of the hotel. To the pod, quickly home. Odd self-conscious silences; all four of us eager to get to it, but the social conventions temporarily prevail, and we pretend to coolness; and, besides, Qui

Our clothes fell away. Her body was trim, athletic, boyishly smooth and muscular, breasts heavier than I had expected, hips narrower. She kept her Transit Creed emblem chained to her thigh. Her eyes gleamed but her skin was cool and dry and her nipples weren’t erect; whatever she might be feeling, it didn’t currently include strong physical desire for Lew Nichols. What I felt for her was curiosity and a certain remote willingness to fornicate; no doubt she felt no more for me. We entangled our bodies, stroked each other’s skins, made our mouths meet and our tongues tickle. It was such an impersonal thing that I was afraid I’d never get it up, but the familiar reflexes took hold, the old reliable hydraulic mechanisms began shunting blood toward my loins, and I felt the proper throb, the proper stiffening. “Come,” she said, “be born to me now.” A strange phrase. Transit stuff, I learned later. I hovered above her and her slim strong thighs gripped me and I went into her.

Our bodies moved, up and down, back and forth. We rolled into this position and that one, joylessly ru

Even so. We indulged in our icy ballet for what seemed like weeks, and then she came, or allowed herself to come, in a quiet quick quiver, and with silent relief I nudged myself across the boundary into completion, and we rolled apart, hardly breathing hard.

“I’d like more brandy,” she said after a bit.

I reached for the cognac. From far away came the groans and gasps of more orthodox pleasure: Sundara and Friedman going at it.

Catalina said, “You’re very competent.”

“Thank you,” I replied uncertainly. No one had ever said quite that to me before. I wondered how to respond and decided to make no attempt at reciprocity. Cognac for two. She sat up, crossed her legs, smoothed her hair, sipped her drink. She looked unsweaty, unruffled, unfucked, in fact. Yet, strangely, she glowed with sexual energy; she seemed genuinely pleased with what we had done and genuinely pleased, as well, with me. “I mean that,” she said. “You’re superb. You do it with power and detachment.”

“Detachment?”

“Non-attachment, I should say. We value that. In Transit, non-attachment is what we seek. All Transit processes work toward creating flux, toward constant evolutionary change, and if we allow ourselves to become attached to any aspect of the here and now, to become attached to erotic pleasure, for example, to become attached to getting rich, to become attached to any ego aspect that ties us to intransient states—”

“Catalina—”

“Yes?”

“I’m very looped. I can’t handle theology now.”

She gri

“I’m grateful.”

“Some other time, perhaps? You and Sundara both. I’d love to explain our teachings, if—”